Chapter 512 The T-shaped rolls are interlocking
Ye Xianggao, Fang Congzhe and others listened patiently.
Feng Ziying's words were a little off topic. How to build, what kind of ships to build, and how to use these ships were all things for later. What they wanted to hear more was how to get the merchants from Jiangnan to take the initiative without paying the court. Willing to set up shipyards in Denglai and Liaonan for shipbuilding.
They are all representatives of the gentry in the south of the Yangtze River. If the imperial court does not provide any money, then the only way to get these merchants to go north is to force the wealthy merchants from the south of the Yangtze River to go to the capital like they did when Emperor Guangyuan moved the capital to the capital eighty years ago. Under the sword, naturally, They can only bow their heads and obey orders.
That time also greatly damaged the vitality of the Jiangnan gentry and wealthy merchants, and also aroused the Jiangnan gentry's dissatisfaction with the imperial court. The confrontation between the north and the south intensified. Now it will happen again, and these Jiangnan gentry and merchants were forced to invest in establishing establishments in Denglai and Liaonan. The shipyard is almost equivalent to a donation.
The amount of donation is too large, and people will be **** there. This is undoubtedly the spokesperson of these merchants, including the entire Jiangnan gentry and merchants, which is difficult for them to accept.
Feng Ziying is also obviously aware of this. These guys are obviously not interested in the specific situations of sea trade ships and naval fleet ships that they may face after opening the sea. They are only interested in how to solve the problems mentioned before.
"To set up a shipyard, I think I can recruit merchants from Jiangnan who are familiar with the shipbuilding industry, and allocate land in suitable areas in Denglai and Liaonan to give these merchants free of charge. In addition, these merchants can recruit some personnel who are familiar with construction. If they are registered personnel, they can be removed from the registry. , including registered craftsmen in Qingjiang and Longjiang shipyards, can also apply in accordance with this..."
This proposal immediately caused an uproar in the palace. Not only the Ministry of Industry, but also the cabinet and other important ministers of the six ministries were obviously unable to accept such a suggestion.
Registered craftsmen and technicians are equivalent to the "private property" of the Ministry of Industry. Although they have no power to restrict their personal freedom, their household registration is permanently fixed, inherited from generation to generation, and cannot be deregistered. This is a rule that has been set since ancient times. Now it is necessary to break this The thousand-year iron rule is undoubtedly difficult for them to accept.
Ye Xianggao and Fang Congzhe were both a little moved.
There is no doubt that this suggestion is beneficial to the Jiangnan merchants who are willing to go north to set up shipyards. However, they are also important officials of the imperial court and have to protect the interests of the imperial court. This suggestion obviously still hurts the interests of the imperial court.
This suggestion is obviously too unexpected, and it is no surprise that it will be firmly opposed by other ministers, especially the Ministry of Industry and ministers from the North. Only Feng Ziying, a stupid young man, dares to say so.
From their point of view, this suggestion may be difficult to support, and a hasty statement will only attract hostility and criticism.
And this alone will certainly not allow these businessmen to invest huge sums of money in building shipyards in Denglai, southern Liaoning.
Building a shipyard capable of producing ships cannot be accomplished by just relying on a group of technicians and craftsmen. Moreover, as Cui Jingrong said, the technicians and craftsmen of Longjiang Shipyard in Qingjiang have been separated from the shipbuilding technology that truly enables long-distance voyages for too long. I am afraid that Many of them are incompetent. To truly be a master shipbuilder, you have to recruit and train them yourself.
Seeing that many of the ministers in the palace were either whispering, getting angry, or sneering and dismissive, Feng Ziying also knew that this would cause public outrage, but if she did not raise this point, she would just watch these two shipyards continue to be so corrupt, and even these craftsmen It would be a pity for technicians to slowly degenerate into useless people, so even if they offend some people, they have to bring it up.
Seeing that Feng Ziying was silent, Zhang Huaichang, the censor of Zuodu who had never spoken a word, said sternly: "If you lose your etiquette in front of the palace, you will be punished according to the law!"
As soon as these words came out, everyone fell silent, and Zhang Huaichang said: "The emperor and the chief minister have already said before that Feng Xiuzhuan should finish the strategy first, and we will discuss the specific situation later. Why do you need to just listen to unfavorable words? With such noise, a scholar who has been an official for many years is not as good as an academy student, how can he be decent, it is simply an insult to elegance!"
Feng Ziying's eyes fell on this Zuodu censor. This person's identity was also very special. In theory, he was from Songjiang, Nanzhi, but his ancestral home was not Songjiang, but Gai County, Liaodong. However, his father had been with the army since he was a child. He lived in the Songjiang Guards Station, and later passed the Jinshi examination and entered the imperial court as a military son. Therefore, theoretically he was born from the south, but at heart he was a northerner, and he was an extremely rare Liaodong native among civil servants.
Zhang Huaichang is the number one figure in the Metropolitan Procuratorate and is in charge of the constitution. He has a dignified character and is aloof. All the ministers in the court are in awe of him. Even Ye Xianggao and Fang Congzhe respect him very much.
After being reprimanded by Zhang Huaichang, the hall immediately fell silent. Feng Ziying then raised her eyes to look at Ye Xianggao. Ye Xianggao nodded. Feng Ziying then continued: "The official also knows that this proposal must be unprecedented, but we and our group After a detailed on-site inspection at Longjiang Shipyard in Qingjiang, if this situation continues, these craftsmen and technicians will basically be useless within ten years, because the technology of shipbuilding is also changing with each passing day, and they no longer have the ability to manufacture what the people need. Their ship skills, instead of letting them disappear into the background, why can’t they be put to use in Denglai Liaonan?”
"Besides, the gentlemen from the Ministry of Industry are also here. We all know that these craftsmen are struggling to make a living and have no interest in the matters arranged by the superiors. They will delay as much as they can and rely on whatever they can. This is different from the private shipyards we saw in Ningbo. The craftsmen and craftsmen must be as different as heaven and earth. There is no incentive and reward mechanism. Whether they do something or not, whether they do more or less, and whether they do well or not, how can we make them work so hard and forget about food and sleep like a private shipyard? ? If you can’t afford it early, if you don’t have any benefits, who is willing to endure hardships and losses for these small people?”
Feng Ziying specifically pointed out that these are ordinary people, different from the "gentlemen" in the palace, so as not to have to argue about the way of education.
Although it is still clear that many people disagree and disapprove of this, there are also some people who are thinking about this issue. At least with Zuodu Yushi's reprimand, no one will jump out and act like a monster at this time.
"When setting up shipyards in Denglai and Liaonan, we must provide encouragement and support to merchants, otherwise how can we attract them? Support for craftsmen and technicians is on the one hand, and allocating land for free support is also on the other hand, but these are not enough. The shipyards have to spend huge amounts of money. It’s not like the investment of money can produce immediate results. In order to find these merchants from the south of the Yangtze River to go north, some measures must be taken..."
The drama is here, and everyone **** up their ears.
"To build a shipyard, the merchants themselves will definitely have to invest a lot, but they may not have enough money, so what should they do? Some people have thought about asking the court to fund it, but after the court has funded it, how can we prevent these merchants from misusing the court money and making shortfalls? If we intervene in the management, will we not distinguish between subject and object, leading to constant internal strife, and ultimately mutual shirking of responsibilities, with the result that things will not work out?"
Feng Ziying asked herself, obviously denying the possibility of imperial funding. This also made some people relieved, some people were slightly disappointed, but more people were interested and wanted to see how to solve this deadlock.
This is something that is obvious. If merchants are to pay their own money to work for the court, they will definitely find various excuses to evade it.
“Xiaguan’s opinion is that he can be encouraged to borrow money from Yinzhuang Money Shop to carry out construction, not only to build shipyards, but also to use this method to build ships in the future,…”
This suggestion made many people in the hall shake their heads.
There are indeed banks and money shops in Jiangnan and the capital. Many of them are integrated with **** shops and gold and silver shops. This does not mean that you cannot borrow money, but borrowing is basically carried out in the form of mortgage, such as gold and silver jewelry and Antiques, such as fur clothes, silk and satin, can even be pledged with land deeds in exchange for money, but that is basically not a loan, but a pledge, and of course there will be interest and handling fees.
However, the amount of this kind of pledge to exchange money is generally small, usually ranging from a few taels to a few hundred taels, and those with more than a thousand taels are basically rare. After all, what kind of thing can be pledged with more than a thousand taels of silver? , if you really have the land deed, you don’t need to go to a **** shop. You can borrow money directly from friends or lenders.
As for the real money shops and banks in this era, they were basically set up to collect handling fees for merchants’ deposit and exchange services, and basically did not have the business of lending.
But this is different for shipbuilding and shipbuilding loans. Thousands of dollars may be spent at any time. Which **** shop or bank store dares to undertake such a job that can make the shop collapse with a loss? There is no precedent for this.
But the eyes of Emperor Yonglong, Ye Xianggao, Fang Congzhe, Zheng Jizhi and Li Sancai were already brightened, and they heard the hidden meaning in Feng Ziying's words.
Regarding the issue of tribute bricks in Linqing, Cui Jingrong mentioned in his memorial that the ban on tribute bricks should be lifted. However, many merchants with skills and manpower suffered from not having enough money to start their businesses, and borrowing usury would have too high interest rates and too high risks. Large, restricting the development of the tribute brick manufacturing industry.
In his memorial, he mentioned Feng Keng's suggestion that the imperial court could open a bank, or form a joint venture with private merchants, mainly to support such businesses that were beneficial to people's livelihood and beneficial to the imperial court.
However, this memorial was later handed over to the cabinet for deliberation by Emperor Yonglong. Although he agreed to lift the ban on tribute bricks, the proposal was only circulated among the cabinet and the Ministry of Household and Work, and was not taken seriously, let alone implemented.
Now that Feng Ziying's old incident has been brought up again, it is obvious that this matter has been taken as a key part of it.
This guy is really awesome, he actually makes his move in advance and responds step by step, making you follow him without realizing it. Both Ye Xianggao and Fang Congzhe saw a bit of fear hidden behind the admiration in each other's eyes.
(End of this chapter)